EFFECTIVENESS OF THE COMMITTEE OX OCEANOGRAPHY 217 



The ship was built. Her famous builder with the Scotch name, Colin Archer, 

 was a Norwegian whose lather had come from this country. The expedition was 

 carried out in full accordance with the plan. We had a great deal more knowledge 

 and more experience this time. 



The drift of the ice was found to be very nearly what was expected, and the 

 ship was strong enough to resist even the most desperate attacks of the ice. We 

 went into the pack ice north of the New Siberian Islands in 1893, and the ship 

 came out of the ice again north of Spitsbergen 3 years later safe and sound, after 

 having drifted across the unknown regions. 



But the spirit of adventure is always urging you on, once you begin to listen to 

 it. When we had drifted with the Frarn for a long time we saw that she would 

 drift across, and the end of the expedition would be attained. But then the 

 adventurous spirit found that something more could be done by two of us leaving 

 the ship with dogs and sledges. We could travel across the drift ice 

 toward the pole, and in that way explore parts of the unknown region outside 

 the drift route of the Fram. But in that case we could not think of returning to 

 the drifting ship, as we should not know where she had drifted to in the meantime. 

 We should have to go to Franz Josef Land and Spitsbergen, where we might find 

 a sealing vessel to bring us home. Again we had to break the line of retreat, and 

 again the method worked well. 



Hjalmar Johansen went with me, and, while the Fram and the rest of the expe- 

 dition were left in the safe hands of Captain Sverdrup, we set off from the ship with 

 dogs and sledges on March 14, 1895. We expected our sledge expedition to last 

 3 months at most, and carried food for that period. But the ice was more difficult 

 than we expected. 



At last we reached the north coast of a land which afterward turned out to 

 be Franz Josef Land, but it was so late in the season that we could not get through, 

 so we had to winter. Instead of the 3 months we were provisioned for, we had 

 to live through 15 months before we met with people. We built a stone hut, we 

 shot bears and walrus, and for 10 months we tasted nothing but bear meat. The 

 hides of the walrus we used for the roof of our hut, and the blubber for fuel. In 

 the following summer we quite unexpectedly met British people, the Jackson- 

 Harmsworth Expedition, on the south coast of Franz Josef Land, and came home 

 in their ship. 



I tell you all this just to make you understand how things, that might seem 

 impossible, can be done when you have to do them, and how a life you may think 

 hard, is easily lived when you have a goal to work for. You may think it was hard 

 to live a long winter dug in, and on nothing but bear meat, but I can assure you 

 it was a happy time, for we had the spring and the homecoming to look forward to. 



You may notice that in the case of these plans, as also on many occasions later 

 in life, I had the misfortune to have most of the competent authorities of the world 

 against me, declaring my views and my plans to be impossible. However, I had 

 had the advantage of living a great deal alone in my life, and had thus acquired 

 the habit of making up my mind without asking the opinion of others. 



It has obvious advantages to stand alone, it makes you more independent in 

 your actions, and you are less apt to be misled by others. Ibsen has said that 

 man is strongest who stands most alone. 



But this does not imply that every man who stands alone is strong, or that every 

 plan which competent people declare to be impossible should be attempted. Be- 

 ware of obstinacy and foolhardiness. For a strong man there is a great danger in 

 resistance and contradiction. It takes a superior man to allow himself to be 

 convinced in the heat of argument by the logic of another. 



I think it was Montaigne who wondered whether the fanaticism which is 

 created by the unflinching defiance of the judge's violence and of the danger, has 

 not more than once made a man persist, even to the stake, in an opinion for which 

 — among friends and in freedom — he would not have singed his little finger. 

 There is certainly a profound truth there. It is the spirit of adventure, but the 

 reverse of the medal. 



You have to take risks, and cannot allow yourself to be frightened by them, 

 when you are convinced that you are following the right course. Nothing worth 

 having in life is ever attained without taking risks. But they should be in reason- 

 able proportion to the results which you hope to attain by your enterprise, and 

 should not merely depend on luck, giving your ability to overcome the risks no 

 chance of coming into play. Even an animal may have that kind of foolhardiness, 

 and success can give you no real satisfaction if it depends on mere accident. 



Let me tell you a case where, in my opinion, the risks should not have been taken. 

 It was the ill-fated expedition of the prominent Swede, Andree. He had formed 

 the project of crossing the unknown north polar regions in a balloon. It was in 



